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Education: Chris Woodhead: Answer the question

Give parents the financial muscle to kill poor schools

Our son’s school, Christ’s College in Finchley, is facing a shortfall of about £450,000 in its budget for the next academic year because of the way in which central and local government levels of funding have been decided. Should this materialise, teachers could be made redundant and class sizes rise. How can we as parents affect the issue? Also, is it sensible that an issue as vital as education should be left to politicians?

Kati Nicholl, London

No, education shouldn’t be in the hands of politicians. Your local education authority blames the government. The government says the authority should manage its affairs better. The school is caught in the middle.

We should eliminate the political blame game and costly bureaucracy and give parents a voucher or tax credit to cash in at the school of their choice. The value of the voucher would be set by the age of the